Movie Review: The Master

Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Master (C) is a not-so-veiled look at a religion not-so-different-from-Scientology with Philip Seymour Hoffman as the chief guru of a peculiar religion, Amy Adams as his wife and Joaquin Phoenix as his apprentice. Once the film gets each of the characters settled into place, however, it doesn’t seem to know what to do with them. Rarely has this writer/director seemed adrift, but I’m afraid it seems a bit of an Emperor’s New Clothes moment.